Big Red Car in the midst of SXSW — the cool folk just call it “South By”, y’all. Face it, you’re cool.
Now this ATX brilliantly warm weather — 68F right now and headed to 85F, yes, that’s cool.
So, there is a revolution going out there — the “people” are finally taking the “establishment” to task.
It is, of course, Donald Trump’s fault which the media and the punditry and the “establishment” have all trumpeted thereby giving Donald Trump even more media coverage.
[Just for the record, I think that even President Obama has agreed that everything is now Donald Trump’s fault thereby releasing George W Bush from solitary confinement during which everything was “Bush’s Fault!”]
The essential nature of revolutions
Revolutions are always the result of anger bubbling over into action and that action is always confrontational.
Again, — anger begets action which begets confrontation which is what revolutions are all about. Revolutions are instruments of change, sometimes violent change.
Revolutions always seek to throw off some mantle that has been smothering the revolutionaries — the Colonists v the English. The normal folk v the SBUX baristas ‘splaining race issues.
Revolutions are not easy. This revolution will not be easy. Freedom is neither free nor easy. It will not be either this time around.
Who started the revolution — who let the dogs out?
It started with the Tea Party which was like the French Resistance in World War II — the last war in which the good guys just kicked the bad guys’ butts and made them eat shit. The French Resistance was organized by a compelling animosity toward the Nazis. It was an odd, but highly effective, coalition of disparate folks who were organized by their common hatred of a single enemy rather than a coalition built around a common theme.
Revolutions are like that — “what are we against” coalesces first before “what are for” gets out of bed.
The revolution hit the streets in 2014 when the Republicans won an enormous victory at the polls whereat the President of the US, one Barack H Obama, made the incredibly ill-advised statement: “My policies are on the ballot.”
The folks heard that statement and acted upon it and guess what? The Republicans were given the Senate, a bigger majority in the House, a gob of state legislatures, and lots of governorships.
Huge victory.
It was driven by the angry muscle worker who came to the ballot box with the disastrous reality of Obamacare in his paycheck and in his brain — the lies to get it passed, the inability to really keep your own doctor or insurance plan, the insane financial implications of higher premiums and deductibles, and the harsh reality that middle class incomes under this President were in the shitter, big time.
It was the first manifestation of anger at the ballot box.
Why is everyone angrier still, Big Red Car?
Oh, dear reader, we cannot even begin to catalog the reasons why folks are angry. I promise we’ll discuss that in the future but it is really the economy, failed domestic policy, failed foreign policy, the incessant lying, the weaponization of the IRS, the corruption, the grip of the establishment on everything. Being on the wrong side of the rigging on Wall Street and at the Capitol.
The list goes on forever and the anger never stops.
Then, of course, there is the reality of the fact that even after the Republican “little people” gave Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan the Congress, they knelt reverently, kissed President Obama’s slip on loafers, and approved the Obama budget that fully funded his entire program without as much as a whimper. Not even an hour of proforma ugly debate on the debt ceiling or Planned Parenthood. Just rolled over and let the President scratch their bellies while they licked his hand.
The people — poorly educated, ill-informed as they are — are mad as Hell at the establishment that has done NOTHING for them.
Where does anger lead?
Violence is always the product of anger. No nuns, fresh from a couple of laps around the Stations of the Cross, have ever started a revolution because they pray themselves through their anger.
The little, poorly educated, ill-informed people (as Ted Cruz describes the Trump tidal wave body surfers) are done with the establishment. They recognize that the GOPe gave us McCain and Romney and that was no big favor as it put The. Worst. President. Ever. in the White House. They can’t even give them back.
The little people would like to jettison McConnell and Ryan at the same time. [Programming note: “jettison” is a made up word to sound erudite (another made up word). No real person ever said, “Let’s go jettison the corruption, the establishment.” Just keep that in mind and remember the reason we don’t know this kind of stuff is because we’re poorly educated. Deal with it. Big Red Car is right there with y’all.]
What we are seeing in America right now is that anger being transformed into violence and the GOPe waging war against the angry people’s champion, Donald Trump.
Violence is bad, right, Big Red Car?
Dear reader, there is a type of intellectual violence wherein ideas wrestle and better ideas emerge. It requires someone to start the wrestling match.
Just about everything we are discussing today was injected into the fray by Donald Trump. Trump has set the agenda and the others are pretending, “Hey, I was interested in illegal immigration. Yeah, I was right there.”
In the violent impact of competing ideas — BRING IT, sayeth the Big Red Car.
As to the notion that these ideas should collide in the pathways to campaign events, as they did in Chicago, the Big Red Car says: “Let it happen but remember there are Federal statutes against intimidating voters and impeding elections. MoveOn.org is funding this stuff. It is neither accidental nor innocent. And, then, there is that First Amendment to the Constitution which suggests that one man’s free speech doesn’t trump another’s. [Haha, “trump” — get it, y’all. Oh, the Big Red Car can’t help itself sometimes.]
This is why we have law enforcement and I say let the riots begin. The clash of ideas, not the blood in the streets.
But, here’s the thing, revolutions are not bloodless.
Where are we, Big Red Car?
Here’s where we are, y’all:
1. There is a coronation going on over in the Democrat party wherein the last vestiges of the Bernie Sanders, socialist, sideshow are playing out while folks are holding their breath to see if their candidate is going to be indicted. Smart money is on Obama protecting her but she has not even begun to hear the worst of this yet.
2. The GOPe is no longer conducting a real primary. It is now a “Never Trump” or “Stop Trump” rally and they are a little late to their own party. Got stuck in the traffic of the folks swarming to Donald Trump.
3. The GOPe, which hasn’t fielded a credible or competent or competitive candidate in a long time, is apoplectic with rage at the little people (the poorly educated and uninformed, in particular) who have failed to behave themselves at their own coronation.
They picked Jeb Bush, just like they always do, they slapped him with a checkbook and sent him out — to get eaten alive by Donald Trump who took his lunch money, gave him a wedgie, and sent him on his way.
4. And, then there is Donald Trump, a flawed human whose flaws are on display in the Smithsonian and who has caught the fancy of the angry man in the street, the revolutionary. He will come riding into Cleveland with more delegates than anyone else, maybe not the entire requisite 1237 he’d like to have but enough that it would be farcical to snatch the nomination from his hands without having due process, a better candidate, and some logic as to why someone else can do a better job.
5. Do not miss this — Trump’s candidacy is at the root of increased voter turnout, infectious enthusiasm, and a complete domination of the airwaves and social media. The folks are not coming out to vote for Kasich (who would make a damn good President in the old days).
You dump trump, you pop that bubble, and you elevate Hillary (unless she’s tied up in Federal prison, a very real possibility).
The revolution will not be bloodless, y’all. Get it on, you little, poorly educated, uninformed people cause right now you’re throwing a no hitter and the GOPe is learning that YOU control the party, not them.
But, hey, what the Hell do I really know anyway? I’m just a Big Red Car. Be kind to yourself and, yes, it is YOUR country. Act like a boss.
